5.0 Buzz - September 2013

The latest rumblings in the Ford universe

House Party

April is a significant month in the world of Mustang. On April 17, our favorite car was born, and that means there are a lot of Mustang shows anchored around that date. In Southern California, it brings about the biggest Ford show around, Fabulous Fords Forever, held at the Knott's Berry Farm park.

Last year, we decided to host our own little celebration by opening the doors of the Source Interlink Media Tech Center in El Segundo, California, for our 5.0 West Open House. This year we did it again, bigger and better than before, in celebration of this magazine's 20th year.

Not only does our event kick off the storied Knott's weekend, but it serves as a celebration of the magazine and a thank you to our loyal readers for riding along in the passenger seat with us on this high-performance Mustang journey. This year we had 60 cars on display and about 130 people roaming around the SIM Tech Center. Everyone enjoyed checking out the Mustangs, sharing a nice lunch, and, of course, having the chance to win some really sweet prizes from the aftermarket, including Afco Racing, BBK Performance, CFR Performance, Comp Cams, Creations 'N Chrome, Dynatech Performance Exhaust, Eibach Springs, FAST, Ford Motor Company, Ford Racing Performance Parts, GTR High Performance, Hotchkis Performance, K&N Performance, Maximum Motorsports, Mechanix Wear, Meguiar's, M&M Towing, Mothers, Nitto Tire, Raceland, Raceskinz, SCT Performance, Stiffler's, Strange Engineering, Whiteline, Wilwood Brakes, and Zex.

We relish the opportunity to mix it up with our readers, check out their cars, have a few bench-racing sessions, share a nice lunch, and give away some cool prizes. It really is one of the most fun things we do all year. If you're in the SoCal area or plan to be for next year's Knott's show, check these pages and our online outlets for news on next year's 5.0 Open House. For now, head over to our website to see even more photos of this year's festivities.

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Brothers Show

Usually having a Florida car show in April is good planning. However, someone forgot to call Mother Nature and request clear skies for Brothers Performance's car show held April 13, 2013, at its facility in Deland, Florida. Thankfully, it wasn't the downpour Brothers experienced for one of its previous shows, but cloudy skies did scare some Mustangers away.

The weather didn't put a damper on the enthusiastic nature of those that did take a chance to come out and show off their Mustangs. Those brave enough to make it didn't have to deal with any rain whatsoever. They were treated to a mix of Fox, SN-95, New Edge, S197, and Coyote-powered Mustangs at the show. Brothers has also opened up the show to Brand X cars, as well, even though Mustangs still dominate the event, as to be expected.

The show featured an exhaust sound-off with $200 in prizes, a dyno competition on Brothers' in-house Dynojet for $300 in prizes, Winghouse girls, and of course, food and refreshments. Brothers Performance shows no signs of slowing down, and the company's next show, generally held later in the year, should be an even stronger event. See you there. —Michael Johnson

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1 Million Strong

As Ford lit up the candles for the Mustang's 49th birthday on April 17, 2013, it was also time to celebrate anther significant milestone—the production of the 1 millionth Mustang at the Flat Rock Assembly Plant in Flat Rock, Michigan. The birthplace of our favorite Ponies since 2004, Flat Rock paused the assembly line for just a moment to mark the completion of this historic Mustang. The car in question was a Ruby Red '14 GT convertible with the Brembo package. It was certainly a fetching combination, driven off the line by 27-year-plant-veteran Ed Salna, with Raj Nair, group vice president for product development at the Flat Rock Assembly Plant, in the passenger seat.

"Mustang is one of the most beloved nameplates in the industry, with fans around the world and throughout Ford Motor Company," Raj said. "The team here at Flat Rock Assembly has built an outstanding reputation for quality while producing one million Mustangs over the last nine years, and we expect that to continue for many years to come."

Perhaps even more significant than the 1 million cars produced so far is that the Mustang's birthday started the countdown to the car's extremely significant next birthday—the big 50. In less than a year, we'll all be celebrating with an all-new Mustang, and the plant is already prepared for that.

"Flat Rock has gone through an amazing transformation over the past year," said Tim Young, plant manager at Flat Rock. "We've invested $555 million, including a state-of-the-art, fully flexible body shop and an upgraded paint shop to make sure we're continuing to build the best of the best for the next 1 million Mustangs."